[Sidenote: _Deeds, not words, are now necessary_]
But "wisdom lingered"! Here and there voices were raised that would not be silenced: "You sang your beautiful song; what are you going to _do_ about it?" In the words of John Stuart Mill, "It is now time to assert in deeds, since the power of words is well-nigh exhausted."
Investigators, studying this union of head and hand from the physiological side, hurled truths at us that startled us from our lethargy.
Every stimulus poured into nerve cells through the avenues of the senses tends to pass out in motor action, which causes muscular movement. In every idea are vitally united the impression and the tendency to expression in action. The nervous system consists of the fibres which carry currents inward, the organs of central redirection, and the fibres which carry them outward--sensation, direction, action. Since control means mental direction of this involuntary discharge of energy (directed muscular movement), control of the muscles means development of will as well as of skill. To prevent or cut off the natural outflow of nervous energy results in fatigue and diseased nerves. Unrestrained and uncontrolled expenditure of nervous energy results in lawlessness and weakened will.
Men of science said: "These are facts about man. What account have you made of them in your elaborate system for educating him?"
Students of sociological and economic problems called out to us as the teachers of men:
These great problems concerning the relation of labor and capital (the brotherhood of man) will never be solved until there is greater respect for labor; greater appreciation of the value of the products of labor; until there is more joy to the worker in his labor, which should be the expression through his hand, of the thought of his head, and the feeling of his heart; until labor is seen in its true light, as service; until the man with money as well as the man without learns through experience to respect and appreciate labor and its products. "We _absorb_ only so much as we can interpret in terms of our own active experience."
What contributions are our schools making to the bettering of social and industrial conditions?
Philosopher and poet--thinker and seer--send their message: